Title: Choice
Author: smolder
Disclaimer: I own nothing. Joss owns Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Walking Dead is by Robert Kirkmen. I repeat, I own nothing.
A/N: Reviews are Good. This has been a subtle hint from the author - Please return to your regularly scheduled reading.
Her power is different now.
Willow almost feels like she should just say that every few years just for good measure.
But it's true.
She was afraid at first that she was slipping, slipping into the dark and vengeance-based magics with which she was so intimately familiar. But although this did feel familiar, it took her a stupidly long time to recognize it, especially given with whom she was surrounded these days.
It wasn't until Buffy playful leaned against her and the Scythe at her hip bumped into her that it all clicked into place.
The power she was tuned into - the reason she was screaming just as loud as anyone, growling and laughing triumphantly when she let loose streams of pure magical energy that sliced through body parts with a glee she had never quite had for fighting the undead previously – was purely Slayer in nature.
When things got bad all those months ago, when the line between epidemic and supernatural became utterly negligible (then simply erased after watching the change of one of their own), the Scoobies all gathered together. And they decided what they must do.
Kneeling beside the collapsed Hellmouth, holding the Scythe aloft with both Buffy and Faith placing a hand on each shoulder, she called all the Slayers around the world to her. To this place where they had answered the call once before to be strong. She asked again – gave them a choice, to gather, to join them.
To hunt.
No one said no.
She hasn't felt the same since. The power of the Slayers has cycled through her twice now. She isn't the same Willow anymore; she has changed, how couldn't she?
Perhaps it is for the best - perhaps not. But it is and she agreed to it. They had a choice and so did she.
Now she just has to live with it.
Live and fight.